Snowstorm of Memories
by Rose Melissa Ivashkov
Summary: FAGE 6: A man and his fiance are told she has a limited time to live. Short story.
1. Prologue

**A/N: As always, first and foremost, we have to give Tiffany a HUGE thanks for organizing FAGE. Gotta admire the lady for all her hard work. A million thanks to Ashes at Midnight for creating a fabulous banner to accompany this story. Another huge thanks to the ladies that joined me for the WCs. Without that, I would have never finished this story. **

**Have to say that I haven't written in a while. And will admit that 3****rd**** person isn't the best POV for me to write. But thank you if you decide to read. I wanted this to be a cooler version of this, but College Math...that is all that is needed to say. **

**Lastly, I hope you like this Hannah ****Pryseski.**

Excuse me for the mistakes!

**FAGE Six Pack: **

**Title: Snowstorm of Memories**

**Written for: Hannah Pryseski **

**Written By: Rose Melissa Ivashkov**

**Rating: T**

**Summary/Prompt used: **A man and his fiancée are told she has a limited time to live.

**If you would like to see all the stories that are a part of this exchange visit the facebook group:** **Fanficaholics Anon: Where Obsession Never Sleeps, or add the C2 to get all the stories direct to your inbox.**

**** www . fanfiction community/FAGE-6-pack/93625/

**Prologue: **

**Snowstorm of Memories **

Dimitri pulled his beanie farther down his face as the Colorado snow drifted about him, snowflakes covering the ground around him furiously. Each bite of snow was a pleasant sting on the skin of his cheeks. The coldness did nothing to him. In fact, he found comfort in it. Every breath of frigid air he took caressed every inch of himself.

Looking out into the distance, Dimitri set out to walk the streets of his hometown, a place he hadn't visited in years. As a matter of fact, he wasn't sure why he found himself here now. But it had been a mistake from the start. He swore to himself he would never come back. The town held nothing of interest to him any longer. Only dark memories he refused to think about. However, as he made his way down his street, small snowflakes landing around him, he realized how much he longed for so long ago.

Dimitri became aware of the crowd that was gathering around him. He wasn't surprised, that had faded way too long ago. Once a high school teacher in his hometown, he had quit his job to pursue a career as a country artist. To say he had found success instantly would have been a lie; it had taken him a year to be noticed by a record label, and a while later soon he came to be known as a bestseller. But that wasn't the finest moment in his life.

No.

Finding the love of his life had been the greatest accomplishment in his life. Too soon, unfortunately, he realized with love came great pain.

As he passed a patch of blooming snowdrops, Dimitri didn't resist the temptation and bent to pick one of the flowers. He regretted it at once. In his hand he held a significant part of his past, a past he desperately wished to forget. He willed himself not to go back, back to the past that haunted him.

There—where he stood was the exact spot where he had met her.

He made one last attempt at forgetting, but his memories had overcome him.

It was too late.

The snowstorm of memories began to fall around him.


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: **

Rose shoved her hands deep in her pockets as she hurried away from the front door of her home, not bothering to lock it. The state-of-the-art security system immediately enabled every time she crossed the threshold of her home. She stopped to look at a patch of Snowdrops that somehow still thrived despite the colder weather, and the never-ending fall of snow that had been going on for the past weeks. She noticed a flower slanted much lower than the others and she empathized with the flower; Rose felt a bit wilted herself.

A low sigh escaped from her lips, the cold becoming almost painful against her. She wasn't sure how long she stayed staring down at the flowers but soon a soft laugh caressed the back of her neck. It brought warmth to her; she wasn't sure how that was possible with the snow falling relentlessly around her. She didn't turn at first, thinking it must have been a random child playing in the snow, but it was the voice that followed the laugh that made her turn around and glare at the person that stood before her.

After a long pause, as an amused smile crossed his face, he finally said, "Hello?"

Rose stared at him a little while longer, longingly. Despite the fact that she wanted to feel the exact opposite of what she felt, she couldn't deny that she had missed him. Desperately. She had been mentally unstable over the last month and a half, wondering when he would be back from his music tour. However, her pining only lasted a few seconds, as she allowed her annoyance to seep back into her.

"Dimitri," she said, curtly, allowing her ire to crawl back into her tone.

"Hey there. I am back." The amused grin never left his mouth once. And hell, that only made him hotter. Like hot enough to melt the snow that surrounded them, Rose believed. She wondered how long it would take them to reach the front door of their home, how long it would be before he was buried deep inside her, how long before he tamed the fiery passion she hosted inside of her.

"I know. I wouldn't have known if you hadn't told me." Rose stepped back, away from him, hoping to tame her sexual thoughts. She removed her hands out of her pockets; the cold bite of the snowflakes that landed against her skin only caused her to think how warm she would be wrapped up in Dimitri's arms, both naked, united as one. She was going to give into her temptation, when she remembered that lovemaking with Dimitri was much hotter when he was irked. _On to getting him angry, girl. _

"What are you doing back here?"

"I want to see my fiancée? Besides, I do live here," he replied, reaching above himself to set his hand against a tree limb that bent from the force of his weight.

"Well, your fiancée doesn't want to see you." Rose turned her back on him. If her plan was working, then it was better if they were closer to her home, at least for those conservative minded citizens that weren't too fond of sexual behavior being displayed in public. And it would be too XXX for those who didn't mind it, she added as an afterthought.

"Why doesn't my fiancée want to see me? Humor me." He followed closely, no sign of impatience in his tone. In fact, Rose heard a slight hint of humor.

"Because her _fiancé_, the one who promised to be there for her at all times, whether he was busy or not, abandoned his fiancée for almost two months, with barely any contact." She had hoped he would become irritated, but it was her the one becoming peeved.

"And let me remind my fiancée of the thousands of dollars I spent on the many plane tickets that were never used, so my _fiancée _could come and see me. But she never did. Oh, and let's not forget my phone calls that were never answered."

"I was busy!" Rose yelled in his face. She judged the distance to her home from her position and was thankful she was almost on the premises of her home.

"If you're going to use that ridiculous excuse, then so am I." Dimitri tried to reach for his riled lady, but she managed to escape his reach just in time. "I was busy, dear."

"Don't talk to me!" she yelled at him. Damn her—she was supposed to be getting him angry. She had only managed to make herself PTFO—pissed the F...off. She was getting out of control, throwing hissy fits all over the place, at every other moment of her life. All through the last month and half of the present one, she had been a wild jumble of emotions and erratic behavior. She blamed her unpredictable behavior on her gender. Yeah, females were generally unstable with their emotions.

She was grateful when she walked through the front door. For one, she couldn't contain herself any longer; she wanted Dimitri. Right then. Instead of attacking him, she let out horrible sounding sobs she had somehow developed inside of her. They weren't normal crying sobs, if that made any sense—they were cries comparable to someone finally lamenting after keeping silent an unbearable pain for ten years. Weird. She had cried her brains out just days before when her great friends had called to check up on her.

Her man was back—what in the hell was wrong with her? Damn, she had missed him.

Before she knew it, she slowly glided into his arms, much to his amusement. She gloated when he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her taut against him. She couldn't deny that she was a happy girl in his arms—nope, especially with how wonderful his built frame felt under her touch, against the boobs that pressed up against him. And soon enough, they were onto each other, both struggling frantically with the articles of clothing that covered them, as they roughly found each other's lips, claiming one another where they stood.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: **

A couple of weeks and a visit to the doctor later, Rose and Dimitri discovered why the lovely lady was experiencing nauseating pain in her abdomen, as well as these weird nocturnal behaviors that involved snacking on strange foods, abnormal sleeping patterns, and Dimitri constantly being a victim of Rose's _adorable _mood swings. The doctor delivered the news with a bright smile on his face, which brought on a vicious mood in Rose. Possessed by her mood swing demon, she demanded the doctor redo the test. When the doctor, in fact, announced another positive, she exploded into tears and ran out of the doctor's office.

Rose couldn't describe the joy she felt within herself as the weeks slowly passed by. Each week, she would glance by the full-length mirror and caress her ever growing abdomen. She couldn't deny the pleasure that overfilled her when Dimitri touched her stomach. The obvious happiness that came upon his face was indescribable. Just as they were many beautiful things about her pregnancy, there were bad things: She wasn't too fond of the waiting game. Did women really have to wait nine agonizing months to meet their child? Rose was growing mad waiting.

Another thing Rose wasn't too fond of was the almost unbearable pain in her stomach that awoke her every night. A pain so extreme she had to stay up at night and wait as the pain would recede but later come back stronger. Rose had been warned by her doctor, even read online articles, about how in Rose's state of high risk pregnancy, women were susceptible to all kind of pains. She didn't worry too much about it, brushing them off as normal pregnancy complications.

One particular night, however, she hadn't been able to withstand the pain. When she realized there were blood stains on her sheets, she knew something was definitely not right.

"Dimitri!" she gasped out as a pain akin to flesh touching a flame emanated from the same spot in her stomach, doubling, moving to her lower back. She curled into herself, but doing so only worsened the discomfort she felt. How, she wasn't sure—how in the world could the pain get any worse? Clenching her hands into a tight fist, she tried to wake her fiancé, trying to remain calm. "Dimitri!"

The whisper hadn't done the job, but the yell certainly had him alert, immediately at her side.

Rose was barely conscious when they wheeled her through the ER room, a fact that had Dimitri worried out of his mind, something she could tell even through her befuddled state of mind. Her eyes closed, she swatted at the air, trying to desperately reach for the hand she couldn't find, Dimitri's hand. Rose's eyes opened, only slightly; she only had enough time to see her fiancé being held back by a couple employees of the medical staff. His frame grew smaller as the hospital employees wheeled her farther inside the hospital.

Rose was amazed and repulsed at how quickly and harshly the stuff put themselves in action; some barked out commands and others meekly obliged to the orders. Among the voices that echoed around the room, she only wanted to hear one thing: they would take care of her baby. If her child was removed from her womb, chance of survival would be a miracle. But she couldn't do much to protect her child from anything, for she was succumbing to unconsciousness.

She woke up hours later, thankfully Dimitri sat next to her. She felt sore from several parts of her body, as if she had just finished a rigorous stair workout. She struggled to open her eyelids; they felt too heavy—or it might have been the fact that she felt too weak to even do the simplest human tasks. Breathing was even a struggle to her. Once she was sure she wasn't dead—it did not matter that she did not particularly feel _alive _in that moment, her only concern was for her child.

It took her several tries to manage speaking, but as soon as she did, she voiced her concern. "Is our baby alright?"

Dimitri leaned away from her, releasing a breath she felt he had been holding for a prolonged moment of time. "He is alive and well." The baby inside Rose validated Dimitri's words when he gave a series of fluttering kicks. She closed her eyes in contentment, setting her hand against her stomach, blissfully at peace now that she knew her child was not in peril. With her son healthy, the rest wasn't important.

She savored the few kicks for moments longer, before she asked the question, "What happened to me, Dimitri? This has only ever happened once and—"

Rose stopped talking as she watched as a disarray of emotions took over Dimitri's face: solemnity, pain, and an overwhelmingly amount of rage.

"Dimitri?"

Dimitri shut his eyes, rubbing both of his hands over his face in a sign of frustration. Rose left him to his emotions, albeit impatience was strong within her.

"Dimitri, please tell me what is wrong?" she begged, forcing his hands away from his face. "Look at me."

His eyes, those beautiful brown eyes that could look deep into her soul, found her. They—he was scared.

"Dimitri—for goodness's sake! What the hell is wrong with me?"

"Why didn't you tell me?" he finally let out, his voice an eerie whisper.

"Tell you about what?" Rose was confused again, and if he didn't start talking, she was going to beat the answer out of him.

"Tell me about being diagnosed again!" he practically screamed at her, but still keeping that whispering voice. She honestly preferred to have him scream at her. His whispering freaked her out immensely. "If you had only told me—maybe you wouldn't be in this situation again."

"Dimitri, what in the world are you talking about? The only condition of myself in is pregnancy. And it's pretty obvious—"

"I am not talking about you being pregnant, Rose! This, this. . .I don't even know what to say. Or what to think. Or what to do."

"Dimitri—"

Dimitri took hold of both her hands in between his, bringing them towards his lips. She was confused, but she was also shocked to see tears sliding down his cheeks. "What am I to do?" he whispered. "I don't know what to do."

Rose understood at once. Her condition—it had come back. Although the doctors had treated her the first time, they warned her the illness had a good chance of come back.

Dimitri put his face in his hands again, hiding his obvious agony. Rose had never seen him so vulnerable, so affected. She wasn't sure what to say, so she was glad when he filled the silence.

"The doctors gave us three options: One, is to surgically remove our child from your uterus, so treatment could be provided to you; Two, go on with treatment, but it could cause serious harm to our child; or three, we let nature run its course and wait to see what happens."

Rose only had one worry. "What gives our son the highest chance at survival?"

"You know the answer to that," he replied curtly.

Rose didn't have to ponder long over what option was best for her condition. She would never want any harm come to her child, even if it took her life.

"I can't. . ." she struggled with words. Not because she wasn't sure what to say, but because the pain on Dimitri's face made her throat constricted with the knot that plagued it. "I can't let anything happen to our son. You know it. I don't want any harm coming to him."

"You're not going to make it. He's not going to make it. Not if you don't get treatment."

"I survived once," she interjected. "The treatments would bring our child more danger."

"It's not the same. This time. . .this time the disease is far more progressed than when you initially contacted the illness. You're not going to survive."

"What do you suggest I do?" she screamed at him. "I am not going to let anything happen to our son!"

"What about you?"

"Me?" she shrugged. "As long as our child is safe, I will be alright."

There was nothing he could do to change her mind.


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: **

Upon Rose's suggestion, Rose was now being monitored in the comfort of her home; she had to thank Dimitri's great income for the luxury. Of course, the compromise hadn't happened without a hassle. As long as she went in for weekly checkups to a licensed professional, she could stay away from hospitals. She refused to be confined again, as she had been a year ago when they had first diagnosed her with her illness. She had already gone through enough with the endless pricking at her skin and whatever medical torture she endured. She had to thank them for her life, but she just wasn't sure she was up for it a second time. Besides, there was a precious thing inside of her, that she had never met, but she already loved unconditionally. And as long as he was content and healthy, she didn't much care for anything else.

Well. . .she did worry about Dimitri.

"Dimitri, I will get through this. There is nothing you should worry about. Only the good die young—if that goes with this context." She regretted saying the "death" word. If possible, Dimitri's face filled with more shadows, more darkness. . .more pain.

"Rose, for goodness's sake. . .Rose. He can live. . ." But he couldn't say any more, because Rose wasn't listening, or allowing him to speak for that matter.

"Don't. Go away with that negativity. Stop. I don't want you here if you're going to be negative."

Dimitri's eyes filled with tears as he stood, swallowing back words he wanted to say, she could tell. And then she saw it, the anger—he had never been angry at her, but now she knew the anger that kindled in him was directed toward her. Without a word, Dimitri left her side.

At twenty weeks pregnant, Rose lay back against the uncomfortable clinic cot, with Dimitri at her side, waiting to be checked up by the doctor. The doctor was making her play the waiting game, and she wasn't too fond to play it. At all. For one, she hadn't had much to eat. Two, she was craving some food from down the block. Three, she was _freaking _ravenous and _that _was cause of total chaos. She wondered why she hadn't ravished her man, who stood deliciously tempting beside her.

"I fear that if the doctor takes any longer, I will start chewing on this paper I am sitting on." Rose was surprised to hear Dimitri chuckle; she hadn't heard that in the previous weeks. She was about to utter more nonsense when the doctor made his grand appearance.

They went through what she called the "arraignment" of a prenatal examination. He asked questions, commented, and suggested, while she sat impatiently, waiting till she could see her baby on the sonogram monitor for the second time. After he was done medically reviewing her, he excused himself and said he would be back with the ultrasound technician. Not long after, true to his word, he returned with the ultrasound technician and began to blabber out words Rose wasn't particularly up to hearing.

"Can we get to the ultrasound, please? I've been waiting for far too long to see my son's development. I don't think I can wait any longer. Besides, I am hungry." She wasn't sure if she was correct, but she thought she heard another chuckle from Dimitri.

"Alright, Mrs. Belikov, Rose—which do you prefer?"

"Doesn't matter," Rose told her, flinching as she poured cold jelly over the skin of her stomach. "Oh, that's cold, but on with it. . ."

The technician placed a device over her abdomen, sliding it over the lower half, moving it around till the device had touched each part Rose's stomach. The minutes dragged on; the smile on the technician had faded.

"Does your child move often?" she asked quietly, not looking at Rose, only at the screen.

"Not often. Well. . .I don't know." She gave Rose a blank star. "I spend most of the day sleeping, not very active. Is everything alright?"

"Um. . ." She glanced at Rose briefly, switching her gaze over to the doctor, and back to the monitor.

Rose saw the technician bite her lip and glance back at the doctor. Even though there had been huge tension between her fiancé and her, right now, all she needed was him. Either he had read her mind, or had seen the emotion on her face, because both of his hands were surrounding one of hers instantly.

"Please tell us what is wrong?" Dimitri asked now, obvious worry in his voice.

There was a prolonged silence. Finally, the doctor said, "There is no heartbeat. . ."

He started blabbering all this nonsense about how these things happened, and especially with Rose's condition, and how they could try again as soon as they wanted—and all this shit. Rose wasn't hearing any of that. No. All she could hear was that distant memory of when she had first heard her child's heartbeat. A distant, fading melody. . .


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4:**

"Another Snowdrop?" Rose asked against the faint darkness as Dimitri walked in through the door, a bouquet of Snowdrops gathered in his hand. She made a face at him, her typical annoyed face.

It had been two months since the tragedy that had happened in her life and she wasn't any close to healing. She was sure she would never forget the awful memory. The simple memory stabbed at heart, like a burning machete was penetrating her heart, multiple times. Relentlessly.

"Why do you insist on giving them to me? You know I hate those," she threw at him, in a tone that rivaled the coldness outside. She glanced away at him, weak and tired. Her illness was getting the best of her, but she refused any treatment. She refused to be confined in a hospital once again. "I am sorry."

Dimitri stood, unsure, at the door of their bedroom. He shrugged.

"Sit with me?"

Dimitri nodded, kicking off his snow-covered boots at the foot of the bed, proceeding to join her inside the warmth of the blankets. She had to initiate the first move, slowly sliding her arms around his tense self.

"Running away isn't doing me any good," she muttered.

"Running away is the only way I can cope that soon I will lose my fiancée because she refuses treatment," Dimitri countered. "I wish—"

"Can we please have one evening where we don't talk about our issues and just focus on the positive side of things?"

"Pray tell, what is a positive of this?" he screamed in an angry whisper.

"We're both together and alive," she mumbled. "Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

"One of us isn't going to be alive for long," Dimitri threw back at her.

"Stop, please." Rose drew in a breath. "Hold my hand—hold _me. _I miss you."

Dimitri needed no further encouraging, pulling Rose as tight as was humanly possible against him. The distance between them hadn't grown, but they hadn't exactly tried to mend it. Losing their child hadn't made things worse. Rose rejecting any medical help for her illness is what caused the Berlin Wall to come between them, so to speak. He just didn't understand that after losing something so precious, something that had meant so much to her, her willpower to live wasn't so strong.

Once they were both securely in each other's embrace, she allowed herself a stray tear to escape her eyes. She promised she wouldn't succumb to weakness and withhold tears, but now in the comfort of her Dimitri's arms, she wanted to be weak. She wanted his strength, his comforting strength. All through the past month she had been emotionally numb, not allowing herself to feel—now, she wanted to let everything go, to let the weakness come in, to let the fear come out.

"Dimitri, I am scared," she admitted after a deafening silence, an agonized sob following after her declaration.

Rose wasn't sure how it was possible, but he tightened his hold on her. She felt his lips at her temple, as well as warm moisture as one of his tears fell against her. "I am terrified. I've already lost someone I loved unconditionally. I don't want to lose you as well."

"You're not going to lose me," she whispered. "It's not as bad as it was the first time."

"That's what you think, but the results say something else entirely. You can keep on living in ignorance for a few more months, yes, but after that—your chances at survival are in the lowest percentile."

"The last time they gave me no hope, either," she reminded him. "I am still alive."

"This time, the same procedure can't be repeated. Now, it's more extreme—"

Rose placed a finger over his lip. "Make love to me."

And with the heated, carnal ache that consumed him, he made love to her.

After, Rose lay back against their bed, with a smile on her face.

"Remember when we met? You tried, with success, to conquest my heart with those awful snowdrop flowers," she reminded him, releasing a girly giggle. They both chuckled as they recalled the memory. There was silence again, but she filled it up by saying, "I am going to get treatment, Dimitri." A small yawn escaped her lips. She couldn't recall the last time she had felt so at peace, so alive, so free.

"I am getting tired, Dimitri."

"Sleep, Roza." There was bliss on his face.

"Will you stay with me? No more running away."

"I am staying here. I will be with you. Always."

There was time for a few kisses, a back and forth fight of "I love you" and Rose fell asleep with a smile on her face.


	6. Epilogue

**Epilogue: **

A frozen touch of snow brought Dimitri back to the present again, still lost in his memories, tears streaming indiscriminately out of his eyes. He hadn't been paying much to attention to where he had been walking, for he found himself half a mile away where his home was located, precisely to the small cemetery. The thought of walking through a cemetery might have disturbed the mind of a normal individual, but not to him; he had spent many nights, sitting at her grave, where she lay next to their deceased child.

"I'll never understand why you were taken away from me so soon. You're gone, but never gone from my heart." He kneeled at her headstone. "I love you, Roza."

As he lay a snowdrop against the cold ground, the only flowers that dared to ever grow in this cold town, he felt a warm wind surround him. He withheld a chuckle as he recalled that every time he gave her a flower, she would give him her annoyed face. In fact, the lovely image was very alive in his head in that very moment. But as with every great memory of his, a bad one followed: The very last time he had seen the annoyed face had been the last time ever to be in the physical presence of his beautiful Rose.

He remembered every last detail of that tragic morning. He'd woken up, joyous, with his fiancé in his arms. . .but she wasn't there with him any longer. Instantly, the content feeling had transformed to misery. He'd called out Rose's name several times, without ever receiving an answer. No heartbeat. Warmth that turned into coldness. At first, he succumbed to ignorance, but he couldn't ignore the truth when it so painfully had slapped him in the face.

The truth was there but his acceptance was not. How would he go a day without his love? How? He couldn't accept that she no longer would be there to hold. He couldn't accept that she no longer would be there to make his life the happiest. He couldn't accept that she no longer would be there with him. He had gone into a fit of madness for a while, destroying any evidence of her existence, until finally he could feel no longer, spending his life at the cemetery, hoping she would be there. Until he came to grips with reality and realized she was really, truly gone.

Now, he remembered her through his memories and the permanent purple band he wore around his wrist, with Rose's name engraved on the surface, always reminding him that despite there never being a day without a snowfall, the sun had come through, illuminating his life in the most beautiful way.

As he turned to leave, he felt warmth surround him.

The snowstorm had stopped.


End file.
